The Pinnacle of Destruction
by Strange and Intoxicating -rsa
Summary: In forty-three hours, thirty-four minutes, and sixteen seconds Zack's life will be changed irrevocably. And with a twisted torture comes a love that can shape a soul, that can save a broken man. Angeal/Zack /For ravensilver/


The Pinnacle of Destruction

By: Strange and Intoxicating -rsa-

Author Notes: This was written for the help_haiti auction several months ago, but I did an epic-fail and completely forgot to finish it. To ravensilver, I am so sorry it took so long. I hope you accept this and like it! Also, note that this is kind of... mindfuckery?

Warnings: M/M sex, references to het sex, Torture

Disclaimer: I, Strange and Intoxicating -rsa, do not own, think I own, or will ever own Final Fantasy VII or its Compilations. If I did, there would be 90% gay porn, and the rest of it would be fighting. Man, I love my sexy guys who know how to kick ass. And how to—do other things with their asses. Oh yeaaaaaaah.

* * *

The Pinnacle of Destruction

Zack knew it was going to be a bad mission from the beginning. It was something in his gut that reacted. Angeal said it was something all SOLDIERs who wanted to make it past Third-Class needed. It was a mix of knowledge and instinct. While it did in fact please Zack to know that he at least had the capability of knowing when shit was about to hit the fan, it didn't particularly mean he could do anything about it.

Zack trusted his gut feelings, and if Angeal were in his platoon he would trust him, too. But it wasn't Angeal leading this mission—it was Lieutenant Marshall. The guy was a slug, slimy and as disgusting as snot, and Zack had even heard through the grapevine the man was hypertensive and avoided salt like the plague. Despite his shortcomings and overall sleaziness (which could be forgiven under certain circumstances) Lieutenant Marshall knew what he was doing. He knew how to keep those under his command alive.

Usually.

"Did I ask what your opinion was, Fair?" Marshall spat, knocking Zack's helmet onto the truck floor. It cluttered and banged, bobbing up and down to the timing of the road's potholes. "You sit the fuck down an' shut your trap! I am not Lieutenant Angeal, Fair. I do not give a shit if you've 'got a feeling'. I've got a feeling I'm gunna put my foot in your ass if you do not learn your place. Do you understand me, SOLDIER? Or do I need to remind you by dropping rank?"

Dropping rank? Zack hesitated before nodding his head glumly, his black spikes limping at the side of his head. "Sir, no, sir. I'm sorry for questioning your authority, sir!" Zack straightened his back and saluted, waiting until Lieutenant Marshall waved him off. It was like he was a common house flea, rather than a SOLDIER. Even if he was recently bumped up to Third-Class...

"Angeal was too soft with you in discipline," Zack heard the First-Class SOLDIER say as he sat back down. The other SOLDIERs in the back of the army truck deviated their eyes, but clung to every word the other man had to say. Maybe it would save their asses one day, Zack thought with a hint of despair.

He leaned down and grabbed his helmet, smashing it down with enough force to give a civvie a concussion.

It wasn't just 'a feeling'. It was something deep in his marrow that told Zack there was something bad going on, something that wasn't alright. The mission was a pretty basic one—a group of rebels stationed themselves in the forest near Junon, and their job was to do what came best to SOLDIERs: extermination. While Zack had killed people before (even if it was on Shinra's orders) the order of complete annihilation didn't sit well with him. Coupled with the deep gut feeling that there was something amiss, he didn't want to be in the truck following orders that were going to end badly.

"_Listen to your senses, Zack. They are usually right." _

But he was just a newbie, and no one listens to newbies.

* * *

Three hours later, under the canopy of leaves, Lieutenant Marshall would swallow his previous words in the form of a bullet through the back of his throat.

* * *

Zack woke with vomit in his mouth and his back being sprayed with acid.

He tried to scream, but all that came was a pitiful gargle. The vomit tricked down his chin: a mix of breakfast, jerky, and tainted water. It took a moment to realize that he was on the ground, his wrists bound in front of him. There was no weight to his body, so he rationalized that most of his gear was missing. Even the comfortable press of his army knife at his ankle was gone. An unfamiliar feeling, Zack noted with a hint of despair.

Turning his head to the side, Zack rested his forehead against the ground (thick, cold cement, he noticed) and coughed up the contents of his mouth, feeling the burn of his throat, which unfortunately did not detract from the burning of his back. Skin and muscle were on fire, and the mako in his body was already pushing up from his pores, trying to cover the blisters of his back. Now his mouth was free to cry out, and the sounds which came with it were awful.

"SOLDIER," someone echoed from above him. The voice was loud, and yet Zack could only hear the ting of something in his head. Something told him he should listen, to grind against the pain in his back. This was important—Angeal told him if something like this were to happen he needed to pay attention.

"_It can save your life, Zack." _

"--no clue if this guy is worth something, but I just take the orders and filter them down. But now that I've got a good look at you, I know for sure that the boss was right. We finally have something that's useful."

Not going to happen.

"Like fuck," Zack said through clenched teeth, moving his head enough so that he could look in the general vicinity of the person speaking. "I got nuthin' to say."

Brown hair, medium length. Male. Dark eyes. Average height and weight. A thin scar under his left eye, barely noticeable. Zack stored these in a compartment in the back of his mind, sealing it away in a watertight box. This could help.

Anything could help.

* * *

Angeal felt something was amiss from the moment he stepped into the Director's office.

The entire day was wasted as it was: the plans to practice with Genesis and Sephiroth was unfortunately ended before it could even begin, and he was still on temporary leave because of the recent mako injections. Zack was also gone, so Angeal could not even train his student in swordsmanship. Despite what Shinra thought, after his injections the last thing Angeal desired was to sit in his apartment and stare at the ceiling. The urge to fight, to wage war against something was almost unbearable. It bothered Angeal when he didn't understand it, couldn't control it. Now that he was older Angeal understood the boundaries he needed to set to protect those around him. However, letting off some steam was a good thing.

But Shinra did not think the way he did, and thus he was left with absolutely _nothing_. Absolutely _infuriating_...

Fighting with Director Lazard would blow some steam on the situation and _probably_ make him feel better, but it would be fleeting respite. The digging in his stomach, between his organs, was not something that could be ignored or taken lightly. Whatever his subconscious was privy of was not a good thing. Angeal hoped that there was nothing to be worried over, that nothing bad occurred, but that tightening feeling was firmly locked into place when he saw the worry charting across Lazard's face.

"What happened?"

"You may want to sit down."

* * *

_Think of something else, think of something else. _

Zack reached into the void and hoped Angeal wouldn't think less of him...

Weak.

* * *

Sixteen hours, twenty-two minutes.

Twenty-three minutes.

Twenty-four.

Twenty-five.

Angeal paced.

* * *

There was a hole in the wall.

Angeal couldn't recall how the hole came to be, but from Lazard holding a once white handkerchief to his bleeding skull, sprawled across the floor, he could take a gander. It would probably be right, too.

"It's been almost 24 hours." Angeal's words were soft and silky smooth like a needle pricking against skin. It was very unlike him—this was something Sephiroth or Genesis would use as a thinly-veiled threat—but the effect it had on the Director was almost simultaneous. Perhaps it had to do with the cracked skull, but Angeal did not want to waste even a brain cell to think of it. "I gave you your time—you have nothing."

"It is not like I am not trying--"

"Then try harder, or let me go."

Lazard gingerly patted his head, wincing when he drew the cloth back before sighing. "There's nothing I can do to stop you—that is what you're saying. You're not asking permission, you're threatening me with pain and a bludgeoned skull if I don't cooperate. Am I on the right track, Angeal?" He huffed and tossed the bloody handkerchief down, bowing his head slightly to the left. "There's nothing I can do to stop you, but I suggest that you at least call Sephiroth... for backup. From what intelligence we gathered before you showed up in my office," Lazard snapped his wrist toward his desk, and Angeal followed the man's lead.

He walked forward and grabbed the scattered papers, noting the splatter of red. His fingers glided across the top of some of the bubbles and spread the mess over some of the words.

* * *

**Avalanche. **

**Junon Forest. **

* * *

"You can leave at fourteen-hundred hours."

"Rephrase that."

"You can leave whenever you get your things."

"Good idea."

* * *

Zack couldn't feel his toes. He knew they were still there (at least as far as he could tell) but his limbs had gone numb some time ago. It was probably the drugs that his captures pumped into his veins—the sickly orange fluid that made Zack's eyes and tongue and hair follicles burn with the intensity of mako... all of the bad with none of the good (if mako could ever have good side-effects, Zack reminded himself with a hum.)

Once that initial burn was gone, all Zack knew was numbness.

"Why the fuck ain't you talking? Did we overdo it, Fuhito?" That last comment was one of his captures, and Zack stored the name away.

"I don't think so... this process takes time. You cannot rush perfection. What we have given him is a potent mixture—if all goes according to plan, our dear operative will be able to tell us anything we want to know. Just a little DNA of one of the First Class SOLDIERs and he should be able to tell us anything that man knows."

_Why even try? It's been... too long. They can't extract memories from a dead man...I'll bite my tongue off._

This was one of Zack's more coherent moments; it would only be a matter of time before it would fade and there would only be the void to greet him. That void—it could not even be said that it was black, or white, or even blue... because there was nothing there to begin with.

When his veins began to burn again, the bright sickly orange filling his vision and his ears (oh yes, he could _hear_ it in his body, hear it pumping through his heart and fingers and fingernails) Zack did not even try to fight.

* * *

_Hands_.

Zack could feel hands on him, but there was something almost soft about them. They felt like a summer morning underneath the trees outside of Banora. Why Banora he could not say... but it felt right.

"Gods," he muttered as he felt breath against his neck, and when he turned his face to the left he could bury his face into thick, black hair. It tickled his nose and when he took in a deep breath he could smell inexpensive soap and the earthy tones of the wilderness. The hands wandered against his back, slipping up against his shirt. One reached to his buckle, undoing his pants.

"Are you sure your parents aren't nearby?"

"Gods, Angeal." Zack felt his elbow collide into Angeal... Wait... Angeal? He felt himself push Angeal away and noticed that Angeal was far younger than he was now. He didn't even have the tale-tell brush of a 5 o'clock shadow against his hard chin, and Zack felt his eyes growing... but the body he was in just flipped his hair dramatically. "Don't you think I have a brain in my skull? I wouldn't have let you even try to do those dirty, _dirty_, things to me if I didn't know exactly where the adult supervision was. Which, by the by, I should kill you for bringing them up. I can already feel it going down. Are you going to do something about it to make it up to me?"

_What in Holy's name?_

"Gen, you were the one who started this--"

"And? I expect you to finish." Zack (or was it Genesis?) leaned forward and shoved Angeal, laughing. "Don't tell me that you don't know what you're doing."

"I don't..."

"Liar. Now, if you'll just stop worrying like a girl we can get back to the fun."

* * *

_Are these memories?_

* * *

This room was cold, and Zack felt his ass numb, his clothes piled underneath his head. He couldn't see far in front of his nose, but Zack felt the warm press of a body on top of him and wondered what exactly was pressing up against his chest. It felt like something was being squished.

"Am I hurting you?"

_What the fuck._

"No, not really. Then again, you haven't done much."

Zack saw Angeal's face. It had lost some of the tender roundness of childhood and there was a thin line of hair growing underneath his lip. This particular person, whoever it was, leaned forward and sloppily kissed him on the chin. Was the guy drunk or something?

"I'm sorry..."

"Stop apologizing. Remember, the faster you get this done the faster they'll let me go."

Zack could feel something pushing against his thigh and touching his... wait.

_I don't have one of __**those**_.

"I feel a little bad that your first time with a woman is because someone's making you--"

"And I'm sorry that I have to."

Zack felt Angeal's chest push against his breasts. "Just... don't try and do anything stupid. Just stick it in and get it done with. I'm not going to hate you. Fuck, I'll probably never see you again after this. Your friends are fucked up in making you do this."

Angeal sighed as he pressed in. "Well, that's SOLDIER for you. Apparently having sex with a prostitute--"

"I prefer the term "lady of the night" if it's all the same to you--"

"--is a rite of passage."

* * *

There was a vivid face to this one, mostly because Angeal was fucking him in front of the mirror in the 49th floor's bathroom.

Green eyes, a mop of blonde hair, and a scar from his brow to the curve of his cheek. Zack could see why Angeal would go for someone like that—he had the hard body of a SOLDIER and enough slight touches of beauty to keep him from being bored.

Zack could feel his cock hardening against the bathroom sink and jutting against the cold marble. Angeal wasn't particularly paying attention to him, but this didn't bother Zack. The hard rutting inside of him (gentle enough not to cause pain, but hard enough to send spikes of please gyrating through Zack's entire body) and Angeal's hands grabbing hold of his waist.

All Zack could hear was the harsh panting and grunting. It rang through the entire bathroom.

There weren't words needed.

* * *

This one bewildered Zack.

He knew from the moment he opened his eyes who exactly it was. He had sat in that apartment on more than one occasion, bothering the guy. He burned a baked ziti in the oven not three weeks ago and made Angeal clean it up. There were mushrooms in the fridge—there always were.

Sephiroth loved mushrooms.

Zack turned around and felt his hair brushing against his bare ass. Sephiroth walked around in his apartment naked? Sephiroth had sex naked? Sephiroth could _be_ naked?

"Angeal," Zack said, and he could hear Sephiroth's voice.

_What in the world is going on? _

"Sephiroth?" Angeal was at the door wearing nothing but a towel. There was a burn on his chest, ghosting around to the back. He looked closer in age than he did in the last... memory. It couldn't have been more than a few months previous. More than the face, Zack recognized that burn. It was from the Midgar Zolom, before Zack became a SOLDIER Third-Class. In fact, that particular scar came from the day Zack got the bump in rank.

He saved Angeal's life.

Sephiroth walked forward and placed his hand on Angeal's wound. "Would you like me to cure it for you?"

Angeal smiled, but shook his head. "I don't think so. The mako'll take care of it soon enough... and... well, I'm proud of it."

"You're proud of him," Sephiroth said, and Zack would have choked if he were in control of his own body. Why would Angeal be proud of that ugly thing? Of him? Zack had messed up and didn't notice the Zolom before it attacked.

"Yes, I am."

Sephiroth wrapped his arms around Angeal, wary to avoid touching the tender, burned flesh. His lips ghosted across his shoulder, and Zack thought that it was the most beautiful skin he ever felt.

_Was that Sephiroth's thoughts or my own?_

"You know, now that he's a Third-Class you can tell him of your obvious affections. Not even the President can stop you."

Angeal turned, and his towel plopped to the ground. "Sephiroth, the man with the heart of ice; I know they're wrong." Angeal leaned into Sephiroth's touch and kissed him deeply, their tongues twining together, and despite the sorrow in the kiss, in their hands caressing and their lovemaking, Zack saw a glimmer of something... What was it?

_Does Angeal... does Angeal love me?_

* * *

Green Eyes was bleeding in Angeal's hands. There was an ache in his throat and a numbness spreading across his body. The world was blurry before him.

Even breathing was hard.

Zack never knew what it was like to die until that moment.

* * *

"I thought we weren't going to see each other again."

"That was the plan."

"Then what're you doing here?"

Being a woman felt so very awkward, Zack admitted. There were things not in the right places: the heaviness in his chest, the tight warmth between his legs. If Zack was straight (and that was up for debate at the moment, if he was honest with himself) he would still never be able to look at a woman the same way again.

"There's a new recruit that's made Third-Class. I want you to..."

"You want me to fuck him, too?"

"Heavens no. I want you to take a vacation."

The woman laughed. "Was I that bad?"

"No," Angeal admitted. "It's not like that. I simply would like you not to have sex with this one."

"What's his name?"

"Zack."

* * *

"You're leaving me for a fucking little boy?"

"I don't believe we were ever together, Genesis."

Genesis reeled back and smashed his fist into Angeal's cheek. "You came to that conclusion on your own. I never once ever suggested that I was done with our relationship--"

"Yes, in fact. You did. Would you like the count of the numbers of men and women you have kept in your bed for the past several years? We have not been exclusive in the entirety of our relationship with one another." Zack knew Angeal's face—this was his 'hope to keep the peace' faces. "And I know you aren't interested in exclusive relationships."

"But I love you."

"And I love you." Angeal stepped forward to cradle Zack—Genesis's cheek. "But I want to have an actual relationship, Gen. This does not mean my feelings for you never existed, because I assure you they do, and I will always have those." Genesis attempted to look away, but Angeal gripped his chin. "But I love him too, and I want to have a normal relationship. I want to have someone to come home to every night. I want someone who doesn't think that sex is just a commodity. Don't try to say you don't think like that. I know you do. Sex is just a hobby for you, and I accepted that long ago."

"What if I said I'd stop? Would you still leave?"

Angeal leaned forward and kissed Genesis's forehead. "You wouldn't stop."

Zack felt tears on his cheeks and his fingers digging into his palms. When he pushed away from Angeal he could hear his teeth gnashing against one another.

"I _hate_ you."

"But... I love you."

* * *

Angeal found Zack forty-three hours, twenty-nine minutes, and thirty-two seconds into Zack's captivity.

* * *

Their first kiss was at forty-three hours, thirty-four minutes, and sixteen seconds.

* * *

Angeal made love to Zack in his hospital room at eighty-six hours, forty seven minutes, and fifty-two seconds.

Fifty-three seconds.

Fifty-four.

Fifty-five.

* * *

In thirteen hundred forty-four hours, thirteen minutes, and fifty-seven seconds Zack would go on a mission.

"Commencing mission in:"

"Three--"

"Two--"

"One mark."

Begin mission.

* * *

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